Quote From: lettiecsI am not sure how I feel about "unschooling". We know of only one family who are unschoolers, and those children are not doing too well on any level. The children place no value on commitments or deadlines; However, I don't believe that is indicative of the majority of unschoolers.
I am homeschooling my daughter for a number of reasons,but will detail only the major points. She did attend kindergarten in our school district and then we saw the need to do something different.
Our daughter was tested at a 2nd grade level when she was admitted to kindergarten. The teachers called me to a conference and said that my daughter actually tapped out the 2nd grade charts, but legally they could not test her any higher, nor were they allowed to place my daughter in the 3rd grade, which they believed was the level she should be placed at.
So my child was in kindergarten where she was sent to 1st and 2nd grade classrooms for math, and reading. In doing this, she would miss out on field trips and recess time, which were scheduled for the times she was in the other classrooms.
My daughter felt left out and lonely. She was never with other children as she was getting her teaching from a couple of para educators in the classroom,and not actually mainstreamed.
She began to have severe asthma attacks and would be sent home from school. My daughter missed alot of school due to asthma and the need for a nebulizer machine, which the school could not administer to her.
Currently my daughter is on a 6th grade level, and if she were still in the public school, she would only be in the 3rd grade. This is a very social child. She has taken dance classes, gymnastics and is in taekwondo. She is also involved in a youth group at church.,and there is also a homeschoolinging organization in our area, which organizes sports activities and field trips as well as art and science cooperatives.
Our daughter has many advantages over children who are in public schools. She does her studies in the morning and is usually finished by lunch. Then she helps me with the daycare children, and helps bake and clean, and of course, she gets to spend alot more time playing. She is getting hands on learning as well as book studies, and will most likely graduate at age 16.
The most important change that has taken place, is that my daughter no longer has asthma. She is a socially and emotionally well-adjusted child.
Whereas public school is not the right option for my daughter, that doesn't make it wrong for someone else. Each child is an individual with specific needs.
Education is important and the options should be researched and weighed very carefully. Each parent has the responsibility to do what is best her their own children.
I am not a parent, so I can only draw on my own experience as a student from so many years ago.
My parents put me through a private religious school. I know it was a great sacrifice for them, but they did it and I feel I received a good education from that school.
Regarding this school debate and the recent show on "unschooling," my personal opinion is that home schooling should be an option for students up to the 6th grade. Above that, they really need the socializing skills they would learn from being in a school environment. Although I do acknowledge the presence of programs such as 4H, scouting, community theatre and the like, they really are no substitute, except perhaps for church youth groups, which can provide many of the social skills a home-schooled student would not receive otherwise.
However, while the pros and cons of each method were debated, the one option that was not mentioned was private school. Everyone was emphasizing the importantance of public schools (although I think public school is a huge failure, myself); however, some mention, at the very least, should have been made about private schools. Not all private schools are religious. There are many non-religious private schools in this country that can hold their own against any public school.
Public school really isn't a viable choice, in my opinion. Classes in some schools are so large, students are lucky if they can get more than a minute or two of personal time with a teacher. In the private school I attended, the classes were small enough so that teachers could devote much of their time to the needs of their students. No "wham, bam, thank you ma'am" as in public schools; instead, the students were allowed to learn at their own pace, with a little encouragement from the teachers.
I have heard many people say that private schools have nothing to offer their students. That's where they are wrong. In my own years of private schooling, I sung in the school choir and learned the piano, played on the basketball team, was involved in the pep club, worked on the yearbook committee, assisted in the audio-visual department, and participated in school theatre. And because it was a religious school, I was involved in the school's nursing-home and community choir ministries. There were also field trips to zoos, museums, etc. So I was quite involved with extra-curricular school activities.
What it all boils down to is this: a high-school diploma is really nothing more than a license to learn.
As I said at the beginning of my post, I am not a parent. But if I were one, I would put my children though private school, even if it meant sacrificing a lot. My parents did it for me, and I feel I am a better person for it.
